Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s policy of renewing and redefining India’s millennia-old civilisational bonds with the Middle East are bearing concrete fruit in the form of strategic alliances and investments in India’s infrastructure sector.

Mention the Middle East to an Indian and he will immediately associate it with oil, deserts, Dubai and, very possibly, a non-resident relative stationed there. None of the above provides a misleading picture of the region; equally, none of them paints the complete picture either.

India has historically had close economic ties with the Arabian Peninsula, especially the Gulf region along its eastern shores, writes a banking expert.

The first historically recorded maritime trade route in the world was, in fact, between the Indus Valley civilisation and the civilisation of Dilmun, which was located on the island of Bahrain and the adjacent shore of Saudi Arabia. Goods, including cotton and spices, were acquired by merchants from Dilmun.

When politicians misjudge the public mood and gamble, the end result can be politically catastrophic. In that sense, the UK election results are nothing short of a political earthquake – the second one to hit the UK in 10 months.

Just as David Cameron had misread the public mood in Britain when he called for the Brexit vote, Theresa May’s decision to go back to the people a full three years before her term as Her Majesty’s First Minister was to expire has also proved to be a grave political miscalculation.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has struck a delicate balance of engaging with China where there is mutual benefit and standing up to the South Asian neighbour where India’s strategic interests demand.

Dealing with China is arguably Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s most daunting foreign policy challenge. That’s because it is difficult to fit the Middle Kingdom into any of the comfortable stereotypes that Indian diplomats have got used to.

One of India’s leading international businessmen traces the factors behind India’s natural instinct towards going global.

The question isn’t whether India can turn global; it is how quickly will India be accepted among the leading nations in the world.

Global trade and business is not new for India. The past is replete with examples of India’s contribution to world trade; in fact, India actually taught the world how to trade, be it spices or fibres or cotton yarn.
In the year when the British came into India – India as a single entity accounted for 21 per cent of world trade. Great Britain was then doing one per cent of world trade. In 1947, when it left India, Britain was doing 21 per cent world trade and India made up 1 per cent!

The new Indian high commissioner to the UK believes India and the UK can work together towards a win-win visa regime.

“In the field of IT, our professionals are renowned the world over. It is very important that our IT professionals can come and work and go back. They will contribute immensely not only to the local economy but also the global economy, which is what they are doing in Silicon Valley and the rest of the world,” says the Indian high commissioner to the UK, Y.K. Sinha.

David Landsman is the Executive Director of Tata Limited and recently took charge as the Chair of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) India Business Forum (IBF) in the UK. He took time out for ‘India Global Business’ to talk about this new role, his wider perspective on post-Brexit India-UK ties and the need to address a decline in India’s exports to Britain.

What does the post-Brexit era hold for Indian companies looking at UK/Europe for expansion?

Over the past few years, more and more Indian companies have been expanding their activities in the UK and across Europe as part of their globalisation strategies. There is no doubt that there will continue to be important opportunities for Indian business, both in the UK and the rest of Europe. It is early days for Brexit and much remains to be clarified.

The World Bank’s representative working at the heart of the definitive ‘Doing Business’ rankings revisits the Indian government’s pledge to improve the country’s rating on global charts. The overall assessment is good but there is a long road ahead to achieve a truly business-friendly environment.

The private sector is often described as the ‘engine of economic growth’, given its critical role in creating jobs, which enable citizens and countries to prosper. However, several factors, such as lack of access to finance or burdensome processes for starting a new business, can undermine private enterprise and, if left unaddressed, can impede growth.

To say that the UK’s vote to leave the EU has ushered in a period of “uncertainty” would be something of an under-statement.

Even though the UK voted decisively to leave the EU, there is no consensus on what Brexit means in practice. On the one hand, a few politicians, along with much of the press, are celebrating the UK’s new freedom to pursue trade deals with fast-growing emerging economies such as China and India, for now this freedom is…

Indian companies, far from being job destroyers in the US, are actually net employment generators, writes India Inc. Consulting Editor.

Republican Party presidential nominee Donald Trump’s flip flops over H1B visas, which allow Indian IT pros to work in the US, show that large sections of the US are increasingly viewing protectionism as a panacea for its domestic economic problems, including joblessness, even as saner voices point to the positive contributions made by skilled migrants like Indian geeks.